http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1001021931Responding this week to growing public unrest about Iraq, and declining personal approval ratings, President Bush has revived an earlier strategy of linking the current war to the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. Today, a White House spokesman went even further, responding to the inevitable press questioning about the president's view of war protestor Cindy Sheehan's return to Texas by focusing on 9/11.
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Q Does the President feel that over the last couple of days he's made an effective and convincing case that Cindy Sheehan is misguided in her feelings about the war and what should happen to the troops?
MR. DUFFY: Well, first of all, the President has spoken continuously about the way he approaches this war, following September 11th, 2001. On September 14th, 2001, he stood at the National Cathedral and told all of America that this was going to be a very long and difficult war, and that there were going to be some very trying moments; but that because of what happened on 9/11, that we had to view the world in a different way.
The bipartisan 9/11 commission wrote all about this in chapter two. The name of that chapter is called, "The Foundation of the New Terrorism." And the bipartisan commission members wrote about the U.S. reaction to terrorist acts overseas in the years leading up to 9/11. They reached a fundamental conclusion: When America takes a single step backwards in the face of terrorism overseas, it brings the terrorists 50 steps closer to our own shores. We saw that after the result of embassy bombings of American embassies overseas, after the U.S.S. Cole was bombed, after Beirut, after Somalia.
The President reiterated that on Tuesday. He empathizes with Ms. Sheehan and those who have lost loved ones. He said Tuesday, again, that they do not represent the view of all mothers and fathers and husbands and wives and children. But we certainly empathize with Ms. Sheehan and those who oppose the war. The President feels fundamentally differently. He'll continue to talk about why it's necessary to win this war.
And I might point that the American Legion, at their national convention on Tuesday, overwhelmingly passed a resolution in support of the President's approach to the war on terror. Bet there was a call from Rove to the goosestepping leaders of the Legion.
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